


A Maiden so Fair

by ALWrites



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Medieval, F/M, Female Byun Baekhyun, Genderbending, Minor Violence, Robin Hood References
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-25
Updated: 2017-10-25
Packaged: 2019-01-23 03:17:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12497476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ALWrites/pseuds/ALWrites
Summary: There is a maiden amidst the bluebells, though there are tears in her eyes. Looks like Chanyeol's dinner will have to wait.





	A Maiden so Fair

**Author's Note:**

> This is a Baekhee fanfic, so if you are uncomfortable with genderbender, please do not read!
> 
> Alsooo, please forgive me for the awful fight scene at the end heheh ｡(*^▽^*)ゞ I reread it a few weeks ago and omggg terrible~~ 
> 
> This story came 1st place in the 2017 Spring EXO'tic Writing Contest ♥
> 
> If you enjoy this, please leave a comment!♥  
> ~Amy(ᵔᴥᵔ)

 

[(Link to AFF version) ](http://www.asianfanfics.com/story/view/1225685/a-maiden-so-fair-genderbender-romance-exo-baekyeol-chanbaek)

 

 

“Well, _hello_ there. Just stay still, _that’s it._ Stay right there.” Chanyeol pulls his bowstring taut until his curled fingers are brushing against his mouth, an arrow poised in position, directly aligned with the eye of an unsuspecting wild rabbit munching on the undergrowth of the forest floor. That’s dinner right there, unless Jongdae leaves the fur on again and unwittingly sets it on fire, something which has been known to happen on several occasions. Chanyeol hates sleeping on an empty stomach.

And it looks like that’s what’ll be happening, as before the outlaw has even thought about releasing his pinewood arrow, the rabbit is bounding off through the trees after having sat back on its hind legs and twitched its ears out for a wee bit, clearly hearing something that Chanyeol quite unfairly cannot. 

He allows himself a little moment to sulk, jutting out his lower lip as he half-heartedly kicks at the sallow oak tree leaves beneath his feet. He hasn’t even been to the market today, so he and Jongdae don’t exactly have any substantial vegetables back at camp that they can dice into a subpar soup. The sun is also already going down, the world now painted in greys and muted blues, thus meaning that there will be no point in lingering around to try and catch something else. Even if he were to find a badger or a squirrel, it would probably scarper too. Sod’s law is cruel, after all.

Suddenly, a flash of white zaps into the corner of Chanyeol’s eye and he jumps to the right, alert and ready, to see a figure running through the trees. His heart comes up in his ears and he can taste metal in his mouth from nerves as he darts behind an oak to cover himself, gripping onto the arrow shaft for self-defence; if push comes to shove, he can just throw it at someone and make a run for it.

In total, he’s about fifteen feet away from the approaching stranger – the person who rid him of his dinner, no doubt – and upon closer inspection, said person looks to be a young woman. All she wears is a long white dress, some kind of undergarment, with no shoes or cloak, not even a bodice. She runs frantically over the thriving undergrowth, bare feet against the flatland as she whips her head over her shoulder multiple times to glance behind her.

Chanyeol straightens his posture, commanding a sense of duty as he realises that this poor maiden is probably being followed, and is now within the boundaries of his (not really his) forest. As the self-proclaimed sovereign of the place where nature thrives, responsibility hardens his backbone. 

The woman comes to a breathless stop in the small clearing before him, bluebells drowning her feet up to her ankles. The sinking sun reflect crystals in her perspiration as she looks fearfully in the direction she has come, the terror on her face strikingly apparent despite the distance. Her flesh is almost as white as the skin-tight dress she wears, a stark contrast to the ebony tendrils rolling down her back all the way to her waist. Chanyeol can hear her panting from here, can see her lungs inhaling and exhaling every breath within her ribcage, and strengthened is the feeling of obligation he has obtained. This woman needs protecting, and protect her he shall.

Deftly, he stores his arrow in the quiver slung over his left shoulder and puts his head through his bow, freeing his hands so that he can raise them in surrender as he reveals himself to the fair maiden that has stumbled upon his modest abode. Out he steps, feet adorned with knee-high leather boots laced up on the outer faces and dressed in a simple set of black hose and a leather doublet. As a man of humble beginnings, he means to have a humble end too – though sometimes his personality is questionable, in that regard.

The maiden lurches when she notices him, her gasp so piercing that Chanyeol’s ears complain, yet he does his best to smile in what he hopes is a friendly manner and says, “Hi.”

Yes, a nice and simple greeting should make her feel at ease.

Or not.

“Who—Who are you?” she stammers, terrified, and even starts to shrink away from his presence despite the distance that already prevails between them. Subsequently, Chanyeol tries to smile even harder in a way that he hopes is harmless, but because he’s thinking so much about it he looks half-confused and half-crazy instead. He realises this when the girl puts her palms out before her in defence, and he quickly drops whatever mangled simper he was trying to pull off. So much for that. What’s Plan B?

“What are you doing out here in the woods?” Chanyeol asks, ignoring the girl’s question. He is a little irked by it, in all honestly, because he thought he was famous; clearly he needs to do some more thieving and outlandish things to get himself noticed. “Are you being followed?”

She opens her mouth to reply, but before she can get a word out there is angry shouting echoing in the distance. The gruff voices of men rumble between the trees, shaking the blackbirds from their nests in the highest branches and sending all potential food running for the hills because _yes,_ Chanyeol _was_ still foolish enough to hope that he might happen across a fox or something on his journey back to camp. He’s too optimistic for his own good, really.

“Come with me.” Chanyeol holds out his hand to visualise his offer, trying for a third time at that smile and praying that they can skedaddle before whoever’s coming comes and realises that he’s the man on all those wanted posters. The girl doesn’t reply to him, though, doesn’t even reach out to take his hand, so he clenches his fist and springs his fingers back out again as he shifts uncomfortably on the spot. “Do you _want_ to get caught?” he hisses, exasperated and well aware of the men growing closer. He can even hear horse hooves now, and that means that whoever is coming after this seemingly insignificant little girl is someone _not_ so insignificant; only those with money have horses, and those with money have power. _Judicial_ power.

There are blurs through the trunks now, flits of movement every other second as the chasers come galloping closer. The girl seems hesitant to accept his help, even when he adds on a sincere: “You can trust me, I won’t hurt you.” But what really gets her to move is when the snippets become previews, and she finally decides that she hasn’t really got another option, let alone a better one.

Chanyeol’s first thought is: _wow, that’s a nice looking hand;_ and his second is: _shit._ He gives her a good yank to get her moving and then guides her through the forest, dragging her along behind him as he uses his long legs to their full capacity. He’s leaping over the ground a little like a gazelle, bouncing over bluebells and ferns while avoiding tree roots and rabbit holes; regardless of his long build and slim layers of muscle, his feet don’t make a single sound. It’s a good trick he’s learned over the years for sneaking up on supper, a trick that has helped to keep him fed.

The maiden is wheezing behind him, flagging with her steps until she’s stumbling along in his footfalls, trampling through every single specimen of plant life and has her skirt unbecomingly gathered up in a free fist around her thighs. There’s a little blood on her feet, Chanyeol notices when he looks back, but that’s not a priority right now. The priority is to get her to the bush, out of sight and hopefully out of the minds of the others, so he’ll tend to her wounds later.

“Where are we—” _wheeze “—_ going?”

“We’re hiding.”

“Wh— _Where?”_

Chanyeol sees no need for a response because they’ve already arrived, and he drags her through an imperceptible hole in the towering whitethorn hedge and turns to quickly shield the entrance with the branch of a weeping willow that lollops down from above. He tugs her down into a crouch so they can peer through the slim leaves, watching the surrounding forest for any signs of life, his hand still keeping hers a prisoner.

Her form is tense, but Chanyeol supposes that is to be expected. After being chased and dragged into the home of a stranger who may hold an ulterior motive, it is unlikely that she is feeling particularly balmy. To quell her nerves and anxiety, Chanyeol slackens his hold on her hand ever so slightly before giving her palm a reassuring squeeze. Clearly, it takes her off guard, as she turns to him with wide doe eyes like she’s expecting him to snap her neck in two.

When the men on horses go racing past like a cavalry, she whips her head around and gasps so obscenely that Chanyeol is afraid they might hear, so he clamps his hand over her mouth to keep her quiet – probably not the best thing to do when trying to convince someone that you’re harmless, but it does do the trick. Once he’s sure the men have coursed by without suspicion, he lets her go, and she sags with relief, falling towards the mossy ground in a splay of white cotton.

“What’s your name?” he asks as he releases her mouth, staring into the most pretty set of delicate onyx eyes he has ever seen. The fair maiden certainly _is_ fair, and Chanyeol is taken aback at the amount of beauty a single face has been able to encompass. A soft button nose, a slender jawline, a slim and pouty set of lips. Chanyeol almost asks her when it was she fell from heaven.

“Baekhee,” she breathes, visibly exhausted from her evening escapades as she places a palm to her heart and rubs her tender chest, so much alabaster skin exposed that Chanyeol feels like reverting back to the cavemen days.

Instead, he smiles. “Nice to meet you, Baekhee.” He grabs her hand and shakes it firmly. “I’m sure you already know who I am, you must have realised by now.”

She blanks. Chanyeol winces.

“Haven’t you heard of me? The outlaw of the forest? I steal from serpents and deliver to the worthy mice?”

Ever so slowly, she warily shakes her head.

Chanyeol gives up, albeit begrudgingly, and reveals what name he goes by. “I’m Chanyeol.”

Oh well, at least she knows who he is now; she can tell all her friends. 

“Why were those men following you?” He looks out through the willow leaves again to make sure that none of them are looping back around, and is calmed to find his view completely clear. The girl, Baekhee, sighs and slots her hair behind her ears, accompanying Chanyeol as he rises to his feet and starts to lead them towards a mossy hole in the ground, encased by gloriously flowered common privet and marked with the robust trunk of a major oak which has it cast in shadow at this time of day.

The hole in the whitethorn hedge has led them into a secluded area of the forest, normally overlooked by travellers and search parties alike simply because they assume no one would be on the other side. Guarded away in a circular perimeter of tree, shrub and bush, Chanyeol deems this to be the safest place to bring a maiden running away from her life.

There are bluebells scattered over the mossy woodland ground, mingling with the tree roots of neighbouring oaks, ashes and horse chestnuts, and there, just at the base of that major oak, is his front door.

“After you,” he says politely, gesturing to the hole while looking at her expectantly, and she double takes before looking at him as if he’s gone mad. “My camp’s down there. I’m not trying to lure you into a hole to kill you, I told you that you could trust me, right? We even know each other’s names now.” He’s probably being too light-hearted about all of this – _again_ with the optimism.

She smiles awkwardly, just trying to be polite, and tiptoes cautiously towards the hole as if she’s afraid of the floor caving in.

The hole is neither insanely large nor ridiculously small, and judging by the fact that her frame is tiny, she should have no trouble getting in.

Eventually, after some fierce hesitation, she shimmies her way below ground, Chanyeol following with a brisk drop, and he gives her a mini house tour of his modest cavern in the dirt. The walls are carved with muscular tree roots from the being above, the wood winding like snakes in and out of the earth to create a natural cavity with sturdy walls and a solid roof. Chanyeol remembers first finding the place over a year ago. It had been nothing more than a claustrophobic hollow at its birth, but with himself and Jongdae nurturing it, it has grown up into a strapping young shelter, ready to protect, conceal and mother. There are candles secured on makeshift sconces burning along the walls and a fire lit in a circle of stones, tended to by his trusted friend Jongdae who regards the two of them in surprise from where he sits on a small log. 

Jongdae has always been an impatient soul and is perpetually irritable when hungry. His untameable black curls mimic his personality, as does his sly smirk, and he prefers to dress more boldly than Chanyeol, opting for burgundies and greens to clothe himself, accessorising with one small hoop earring in his left lobe and a leather coif to tidy up his appearance, the hat flattening down his feral curls and squashing the front section against his forehead. He looks a little like a puppy, Chanyeol thinks offhandedly.

“I thought you were catching squirrels, not girls,” Jongdae says flatly, the blackened stick in his hand jabbing the aflame kindling. It sends sparks towards the crevice between several oak roots overhead where slits of light shine through.

“Well, unexpected situations arise and it is our job to adapt to them.” Chanyeol shrugs, sort of trying to impress the girl with his philosophy. He used big words, so he should get bonus points. “This is Baekhee. She was being chased by some men in the woods and is just about to tell us why. Baekhee, this is Jongdae, my partner in crime.” He grins, sitting down on the log by the fire beside Jongdae and eagerly patting the space next to him.

“Wait—hold on, does this mean you didn’t catch anything for dinner?” Jongdae interrupts as Baekhee gingerly sits down, repositioning her skirt around her ankles afterwards. When Chanyeol shakes his head, Jongdae curses and crosses his arms, swivelling around to Baekhee and bluntly saying, “Right, this story had better be good.”

Baekhee blanches at the sudden pressure, and Chanyeol swats his friend on the arm for being so inconsiderate, even though he’s a bit excited to hear it himself too. The maiden looks ambivalently between them before she sucks in a big breath and decides to start her tale, entrancing both men instantly just because of how smooth her voice sounds. It’s like honey, and marzipan, and all things sweet. 

“Well, um… The county governor realised that his wife was barren earlier this week.”

It could just be a trick of the light, a fiery reflection in her eyes, but Chanyeol swears that she is starting to tear up.

“So, he had her hanged for fraud or treason, I don’t know which. His castle is near here, so he sent some men to our village to find him a new wife and they chose me _.”_ A shuddering breath jerks through her body and Chanyeol belatedly grasps that this isn’t going to be a happy tale at all. He even berates himself for thinking it would be, for being so foolish as to assume; she was running away from men in the woods, for Christ’s sake, of course it wouldn’t be because of anything good.

She quickly wipes her eyes, voice getting fainter with every word, and Chanyeol scowls now at the mention of the governor. He and that pig go back to even before he moved here. The fat man has been after his thieving arse for years now, yet so far, he has managed to elude all confrontation and consequences.

“They said the wedding was tomorrow, but that I needed to have dinner with him tonight, so I went with them and ate in his castle. I was just trying not to get into trouble. When we were done eating, he told me that it was too late for me to go back home and that I would have to stay the night there, so he took me to a room and told me to sleep. I really didn’t want to stay but I didn’t know what else to do and I was so far away from home, so when he left and shut the door I started to get ready for bed and I took my shoes and dress off, but then he barged back in and tried to—he tried to—” She chokes, tears casting trails of glimmering firelight gold on her cheeks. “I just grabbed a candelabra and hit him around the head with it, and then I ran and they all started chasing me and—”

Chanyeol grimaces at the joyless recount and is overcome by a new sense of maturity as he wraps his arm around her shoulder to pull her in for a hug. To his muted and inward delight, she doesn’t recoil from him, though she does cry into her palms and not his chest.

“It’s alright now, you’re safe here,” he tells her in earnest, rubbing her arm comfortingly before giving her a little squeeze. “Your home is my home for as long as you need it.”

Jongdae looks a little troubled when they exchange glances, but he says nothing in consolation as he doesn’t really do feelings.

“What do you want in return?” she asks when she pulls her puffy face from her palms, eyes still glassy as she looks up at him gratefully.

“Nothing.”

Spluttering, her mouth moves like a fish for a moment. “N- _Nothing?”_ she stammers, disbelieving as she stares at him with wide, befuddled eyes, and when Chanyeol nods to assert himself her jaw goes slack. “But I—I can’t just give you _nothing—”_

“You are a worthy mouse,” Chanyeol smiles, “therefore, it is my job to protect you.”

Jongdae pretends to throw up in the background, but Baekhee smiles, so it’s alright.

The night runs quite smoothly, to Chanyeol’s surprise. He lends Baekhee a pair of his boots and one of his shirts to wear over her dress, and he and Jongdae scrounge around in their dwindling supplies to see if they can scrub up anything for dinner so that their new guest doesn’t go hungry – even though she has already eaten dinner, a fact that Chanyeol fails to acknowledge in his bid to impress. She is, after all, a very pretty lady.

Jongdae is busy fanning the smoke through the gaps in the tree roots when Chanyeol helps Baekhee prepare for bed, providing her with extra blankets and pillows to deliver maximum comfort, albeit some are not in the best of conditions. The trouble with living underground is definitely the bugs – Chanyeol learns that Baekhee screams like a banshee when she sees a worm – and the damp washed in from rainfalls. Most times, their ceiling drips with water, and anything they leave unprotected against the walls or ground is at risk of going mouldy. It’s tough, but it’s all they have; it’s no skin off Chanyeol’s nose anyway, as he has always rather fancied himself a challenge.

In order to give Baekhee the most room on the bed – nothing more than one end of the cavern padded out with blankets and pillows – Chanyeol squashes up next to Jongdae who does nothing but whinge at him the whole time about not being able to breathe. He’s only over exaggerating, though, so Chanyeol decides to hug him and _really_ take his breath away by squashing his lungs. His best friend knocks him away by the face, naming him a dung beetle before giving him the cold shoulder. Jongdae has always had an affinity with words, namely insults; it makes Chanyeol smile all the way into a dream.

Morning comes, night having passed at the expense of Chanyeol’s spine, and over a lacklustre breakfast, he brings up a thought that had been bugging him in those lonely moments before sleep. “Perhaps you should stay here a little longer,” he chirps to Baekhee as he pecks the mud out from under his fingernails, subconsciously wanting to make himself look more attractive, “to try and convince the governor that you’re dead.”

It’s a sound suggestion, if he may say so himself, and Baekhee takes a moment to think before she nods easily in agreement. And thus, life cohabitating in the forest begins.

He starts by teaching her the ropes, showing her how to go about basic daily activities while being safe and careful. Proudly, he tells her all about how she should make water behind a bush for privacy, and if she needs to do something a little more solid, a hole is required for it to go in. Around midday, he escorts her to the nearby stream that they wash in and demonstrates how to carefully ascend and descend the muddy bank. In the evening, he brings her hunting, where he successfully acquires a badger for dinner. His man-pride definitely peaks when he kills the animal with a single shot to the head; Baekhee seemed impressed.

“So this is how you live,” the maiden murmurs into the quiet, hugging her arms around her torso and rubbing her skin to bring warmth to it. Her eyes watch her feet as she strolls back to camp with Chanyeol on her left, the outlaw walking on an angle as the dead badger over his shoulder weighs him down on one side. “It’s very peaceful, but,” she laughs lightly, “a little dirty, too.”

Chanyeol smiles, glancing at her with satisfaction. Baekhee is a very adaptable woman, a being that will mould to best fit her circumstances, and Chanyeol finds it extremely admirable. Not once has she complained or refused to do anything and it makes her all the more beautiful, as beauty is not just about looks.

“You get used to it,” he chuckles, enjoying their peaceful stroll through the brush.

She nods to show her understanding, clearly appreciative of the nature around her, and they exchange a gentle smile with one another just before they squeeze through the hedge and disappear into the dirt. Chanyeol’s stomach turns unexpectedly, yet he cannot fathom why.

“I’ve remembered who you are now,” Baekhee speaks up later on when they’re back below ground, wedges of badger meat sizzling over the fire by Jongdae’s skilled hand. “You’re that thief.”

Chanyeol grimaces, scratching at his temple. “I prefer the term ‘hero’, really.” The warmth of the fire chases away the goosebumps running up his arms and down his legs, and he shudders appreciatively from the beacon of light in their dank cavern.

Once again, Baekhee laughs, and Chanyeol is enamoured. “I suppose so.” She nods, pushing some hair back over her shoulder; Chanyeol suddenly wants to reach out and caress it, but doesn’t because that would be weird. He doesn’t want it to be weird, though. “You’re quite famous around our village, actually, it just took me a while for your name to click in my head. We see you as our guardian angel. We know that if anyone is in desperate need of help, you’ll come along and provide it. It’s nice, and it makes us feel safe. Safety is hard to come by these days because of the governor.”

With his elbow to his knee and his fist to his temple, Chanyeol looks across at her and beams like a madman. “That’s me,” he waggles his eyebrows, “your guardian angel.”

Her laughter tickles his chest and he’s winded for a moment, only recovering when Baekhee asks, “Is it not compulsory to sing a campfire song whilst in the presence of a campfire?”

Jongdae looks horrified from where he’s crouched by the fire, turning the meat. “We don’t sing.”

“I do,” she admits bashfully, smiling all giddily before she clears her throat and straightens her posture. She sings then, voice as sweet as a siren, and Chanyeol is heading straight for the rocks of a stormy shore, about to ground his ship and submit to the ocean. He forgets who he is and where he is while he listens to her, enraptured, and hearing such splendent notes pouring from a becoming smile is probably the closest he’ll ever get to heaven.

That night, even with Baekhee’s melody running circles in his head, Chanyeol struggles to get to sleep. Not only does Jongdae’s breathing sound like the gusting wind, but there’s also a lump of dirt pressing against his shoulder blade that hadn’t been there before and he thinks it has something to do with Jongdae stealing his blanket as some kind of unwarranted revenge for the one-sided hug they had shared last night. He shuffles again to try and get comfortable, wiggling around in an attempt to find an adequately flat spot, but it is all to no avail. Sighing, he gives up, and is about to close his eyes in defeat, about to grin and bear it, when he hears rustling on his right.

“You don’t have to sleep all the way over there, you know.” It’s Baekhee, awake and confusing his feelings yet again with her bewitching looks and silvery vocals. “There’s plenty of space over here.”

Admittedly, the distance Chanyeol has put between them is a little melodramatic, but he was just trying to be polite. “Oh, so there is,” he laughs, pretending to be surprised as he awkwardly slides closer. “You don’t mind?”

“Of course not,” she smiles, looking so adorably sleepy with her leisured blinks and face half squished into the feather pillow. Chanyeol goes back to staring at the ceiling because looking at her is making him feel strange, and he’s about to return to sleep again when she perks up. “How long have you been living like this?”

His eyes snap open, staring at the murky tree roots. The only light source they have is the dying embers of the campfire two metres away from his feet. It’s cooler now, but they have managed to contain some heat underground. Still, his body is wrought by the occasional shiver, and it makes him want to give up his blanket to Baekhee to ensure that she doesn’t have to go through the same thing, as menial as it may be.

“A year and a half,” he replies lowly. “This place is like home to us now.”

She smiles faintly, humming once. “What did you do before this, then? Or have you done this all your life?”

Chanyeol sighs, letting his exhale blow down the fortifications encasing his mind and innermost memories. “I was a soldier before,” he says – stupefying her, if her little gasp is anything to go by. “I fought in the King’s wars, lost some good friends along the way, and one day I just woke up and thought, why am I putting my life on the line for a king and a country who wouldn’t do the same for me? So once the war was won I left the army and decided to start living for myself. You have to be selfish when you’re young, otherwise you’ll never be happy.”

Her lips purse as she watches him, then she repositions her head on the pillow so that all of her winsome face is visible and rests her hands out in front of her. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-one. You?”

“Twenty,” she replies, her following smile dreamy. “So how did you and Jongdae meet?”

“In a tavern, actually. I was travelling the roads and I went in to get myself an ale – walking is thirsty work – and I came across this man, or boy, who couldn’t afford to pay for his drink. He was about to be thrown out of the place but I decided to step in and pay the difference. We’ve been together ever since, and that was three years ago.”

Her eyebrows raise in surprise. “Wow, you’ve been friends for a while.”

“Yep.” Chanyeol nods, suddenly feeling oddly sentimental. Jongdae had been a scrawny thing when he met him, wearing patchwork clothes and sporting hair so long it covered his eyes. On that day when they first met, he discovered that Jongdae had been orphaned around five years prior, and at only sixteen years of age was struggling to find paying work. When they banded together, Chanyeol recalls Jongdae making a comment about them both being lost causes, and from that moment on Chanyeol has worked to change Jongdae’s outlook on life. It had been that sense of obligation again, that desire to help people, that had led him to do it; and once he had seen Jongdae flourish, he had made helping people his sole career, never mind how unorthodox it may be.

“I don’t have much in the way of friends,” Baekhee murmurs, tracing spirals into the blankets between them with her delicate fingertips. Chanyeol wants to hold her hand. It would certainly complement his own, but he doesn't. They are only just starting to connect, build a bond. He doesn't want to spoil the moment by doing something which could make her uncomfortable.

“You don’t?”

“No.” She shakes her head glumly, briefly meeting his eyes before yielding her gaze back to her ivory fingers. “There aren’t many people in the village who are similar to my age, see. There is another boy and girl who are relatively the same but they’re married and don’t really want me around. I tend to stick with my family more and keep myself busy with work, but I haven’t really found a proper profession yet.”

Chanyeol hums. “Well, what does your mother do? Could you not work with her?”

Baekhee’s expression is strained in a pained sort of way, and Chanyeol worries that he’s struck a nerve. “My father tells me she was a dress maker, and she used to help repair the villagers’ clothes, but I don’t really want to do something like that. She’s not around to teach me anyway.”

“O-Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

She smiles serenely, appreciative of his manners, and the look she gives him is incomprehensible. There is almost too much affection in her eyes. “It’s alright. It was a long time ago.”

Chanyeol swallows, struggling to interpret what such an expression could mean. When he returns with not a single theory, he disbands his search and focuses back on the conversation at hand. “How did she...?”

“Childbirth. Me,” she laughs emptily. “My father says she caught an infection from one of the villagers’ dirty hands. Seems silly, doesn’t it? How something as simple as washing your hands could save someone’s life.”

His eyebrows knit together while he mulls thoroughly over the information. Too many accidents happen from lack of care, in his opinion. “Yeah…”

“Oh! Sorry, I’m keeping you up,” she whispers apologetically, newly considerate of Jongdae who is already snoozing away, lowering her voice so she won’t disturb him. “Sleep well, Chanyeol.”

“Yeah, you too,” he returns the favour, looking over at her with something swelling in his chest. He watches as her eyes fall closed and her muscles relax, stares in amazement at how beautiful her breathing looks, and then he sees it: something wriggling out of the dirt by her head, and he balks. Not today, Sir, he thinks mightily. _Not today._

He shuffles closer, trying to remain as quiet as possible so as to not wake her, and then he snatches the writhing worm up between his finger and thumb and flings it across the cavern. With squinted eyes, he tries to suss out where it has landed to see if there’s a likely chance it’ll come slithering back, but when he realises that he can’t see much of anything through the gloom he decides to leave it. Looking back down for one last check on Baekhee, he freezes when he realises that she is staring right at him, her piercing gaze causing his spine to suffer a shivering wrath. It’s so creepy to be expecting a pair of eyelids and end up with a pair of eyeballs instead.

“What are you doing?” she whispers, sounding a little uneasy while she avoids his gaze. Their position isn’t really the best position to be in, as Chanyeol is leaning his torso over her body and his head is hovering above her head, basically locking her in against the ground, and he wonders what he could say in this situation to convince her that he’s not some crazy somnophiliac out to touch places that ought not be touched without permission.

Regrettably still, he settles for: “There was a worm.”

Instantly, Baekhee catapults out of her skin and cowers towards his chest, glaring over her shoulder accusingly and fearfully at the wall as she clings onto his shirt. “ _What?!_ Where?” she whisper-screams, panicked and alarmed until Chanyeol tells her that it’s gone. “Gone? _Where has it gone?!”_ she continues to freak out, and Chanyeol cannot help but be endeared by her display of fright.

“Hey, it’s alright, I threw it away.”

“Threw it away? Into the fire, right?” She gawps at him restlessly.

“Sure, into the fire.”

“Oh,” she slumps in relief, “okay then, that’s alright.” Settling, she falls back against the padding and pillow, her porcelain face framed by ebony waves. “Thank you.” She winces, now embarrassed. “I don’t like worms very much.”

Chanyeol grins, smitten. “I’ve noticed. And you’re welcome.”

Her finishing smile is as sheepish as sheepish can get, and Chanyeol is besotted with it.

After that ordeal, they both fall asleep into an uneventful slumber, questionably close to one another. Their hands are almost touching and they’re practically sharing breath, and when Jongdae wakes up to the birds in the morning, he rises and narrows his eyes at them suspiciously. Hanky-panky is most certainly not allowed in _his_ dirt-cave.

 

*

 

Three mornings later, Chanyeol departs for town with Jongdae at his side – though not before lecturing Baekhee on how to stay safe in their absence. She insists that she’ll be fine, practically pushing Chanyeol towards the cavern exit with arguably a little too much enthusiasm, and even bids them a farewell with a cheery, “Be safe!” Chanyeol marvels all the way to the road about how she’s concerned for him.

The trip to town is forgivingly ordinary. Jongdae and himself pay a visit to the market in order to support the local farmers, buying a diverse assortment of vegetables and a few pails of milk to sustain them for the next couple of days. Then, they set their sights on the highway coming in from the capital, hiding out in the bushes at the side of the road, all ready and prepared to pounce on any carriage that has the misfortune to come clattering past.

Together, they steal from a lord and his lady, snatching away their fine jewellery and gold by the handfuls and stashing it away inside the sacks draped over their shoulders. Before Chanyeol leaves to let the carriage pass on, he notices a small cupboard built into the leather boarded wall. He opens it out of mere curiosity to find a toothed comb inside, along with an assortment of pins and brooches. Baekhee flashes across his mind, Baekhee with her magnificently lustrous hair, and he sweeps the comb up in his hand. He finds himself childishly excited to present her with a gift – a token of his affection – and begins to daydream about how she’ll react.

When they return to camp, Chanyeol finds Baekhee sat above ground amidst the bluebells, gently humming to herself as the ends of her hair sway in the fragrant breeze. The way she hugs her knees makes her look so fragile, yet Chanyeol has witnessed just how resilient she is. What she lacks in physical strength she makes up for with her fierce mentality. Chanyeol is no less than captivated.

So taken aback by the ethereal sight of her doing something as simple as existing, Chanyeol rapidly offloads his fruits onto Jongdae without any prior consultation. His friend stumbles as he tries to catch his sack, clucking his tongue in annoyance as he snidely grunts a few insults under his breath about how Chanyeol is a whipped donkey and needs to grow a pair, but the outlaw doesn’t notice, too busy ogling the angel in his presence.

“She’s beautiful,” he whispers to his companion, eyes glued to the sight of Baekhee in the spring flowers, appearing so tranquil and light.

“I have eyes,” Jongdae grunts impassively. “I _know._ ”

Without another word, Chanyeol starts moving towards her, capturing her attention when his legs emerge in her line of sight. She glances up at him and smiles, and his heart starts to palpitate in his chest. How can she be so splendid? Her skin is iridescent, even in the fading light, and she has this aura about her, a celestial vibe that even priests could not explain even if they wanted to. All she wears in a pair of black leather boots and her white underdress. She shouldn’t be so prepossessing. Yet she is.

A little clumsily, Chanyeol reaches for the comb wedged safely in the string of his bow and offers it out to her, heart faltering slightly when he feels her fingers brush against his own like lightning.

“A comb, for you,” he narrates rather dumbly, struggling to start a decent conversation what with all his damned nerves. He sits down with less trouble, though, easing into the space beside her without squashing any bluebells with his posterior. Accidentally, he has left very little space between them, their shoulders only a few centimetres apart, yet she doesn’t seem to mind.

“For me?” she wonders breathlessly, eyes sparkling as she admires the comb in her hands and starts to gently rake it through the ends of her hair. “Thank you, Chanyeol, it’s lovely.”

From its reddish tinge, Chanyeol guesses that it’s made from cherry wood, and the hue most definitely suits Baekhee’s complexion. As would most colours, Chanyeol imagines. He enjoys the peace, witnessing the tangles in her silken hair gradually be resolved until her waves flow like a liquid through the air, and then Baekhee asks, “Did you steal it?”

Chanyeol breaks out in a mischievous grin, caught red-handed and going quietly to the girl with the glorious hair. “Technically, yes, but I’m sure no rich lady is going to miss a comb.”

There’s a hint of a smile on Baekhee’s lips, but she doesn’t let it grow beyond its birthing stage for the sake of appearances. Chanyeol knows she is only playing, though; she has known he is a thief for a living since the very beginning, why would she change her tune now?

“I suppose you took other things as well, though? Not just the comb?”

Shrugging, Chanyeol chuckles, the corners of his lips tugging up as he watches her flip her glossy hair over her shoulder, the strands reflecting the pale light of the late afternoon. “That’s beside the point,” he challenges, making her smile mirthfully.

His mind runs off, instantaneously wondering what else he could give her that she’ll like. Women like jewellery, don’t they? Earrings and necklaces with fat diamonds and rubies. And patterned clothes? Fancy corsets with embroidered flowers and skirts of rich emerald green. Brooches? The likeness of a bee sculpted from onyx and topaz or a dragon fly crafted with a plethora of sapphires. And… _compliments!_

“Your hair, it’s—um—it’s—” he panics, “very _long_.” For sure, the women are throwing themselves at his feet whenever he utters a killer one-liner such as that. He is practically drowning in the overpowering presence of the opposite sex wherever he goes. 

Her eyes light up, squinting into the most adorable crescent moons – how they can do that, Chanyeol is none the wiser – as she basks in his words. “Thank you,” she laughs gently, like the song of a wood elf on the wind. “I only cut it once every five years so that I can sell it to a wig maker to bring in some extra money.” Chanyeol suddenly wants a wig. “My family only has a few cows and a couple of sheep, so it’s hard to make ends meet most of the time.”

“You cut it off?” he repeats, a little appalled, in all honesty. Surely it is too sacred to part with? But he _does_ want that wig.

“It grows back quite quickly,” she beams at him, the apples of her cheeks pushing against her eyes again. “I cut it at my shoulders, just here.” With her hand, she gestures. “The people in the village don’t really agree with my decision. They think that a lady should have long hair all the time, but we need the money, so…” She shrugs, dropping her gaze to her knees as she clasps her hands around them, fingers entwined.

“You should be a singer,” Chanyeol suggests brightly, noting the peachy blush spreading across her cheeks as she tries to fight a smile. “Your voice is incredible; I’ve never heard another like it. You’d earn good money, I reckon, if you toured taverns and inns. Maybe you could even perform for the king one day when you get famous enough.”

“For the king?” She makes contact his eyes and smiles widely. “I don’t think so.” Her blush deepens, as does Chanyeol’s sentiment.

He nudges her arm with his elbow to instil some faith. “Come on, don’t put yourself down. You have an exceptional talent, it’s cruel to keep it hidden away from the world.”

Timid, she tucks some hair behind her ear and looks at him with fluttering eyelashes, cheeks ablaze. “You think so?”

“I tell no word of a lie.”

She laughs bashfully, playing with her hair a little more as she goes over it with the comb a second time. “I wonder what my father would say to that,” she grins, excited by the notion with just an ounce of nerves. “I think he would support me, but he wouldn’t want me to leave town.”

“Birds have to leave their nests one day.”

“Mmm… But I’ve left prematurely, haven’t I?” Suddenly, the atmosphere is sombre, the comb laid to rest on her knee caps. “I haven’t seen my father or my brother in four days. I’m worried for them, Chanyeol. What if they’re struggling to cook for themselves? Or what if my brother has gone out looking for me and left Father all by himself? His hands are stiff and they pain him. He can’t do many things on his own anymore.”

In a worthy mouse’s time of need, Chanyeol prospers. He takes his arm and wraps it around her shoulders, narrowing those few centimetres between them to nothing as he reels her into his side. “I’m sure they’re both fine,” he assures her, position intimate as he talks directly into her hair. “Your father must have opposed to the governor’s plans. Wouldn’t he be glad that you escaped?”

She sniffles, the sound making Chanyeol’s heart convulse. “The governor’s men – they punched him when he told them they couldn’t take me. He’s hurt, Chanyeol. They would have beaten him if I hadn’t stepped in. He’s just a harmless old man, and he was only sticking up for me. Why should that result in violence? Why does _everything_ result in violence?”

“That’s just the way it is. Man believes that the only way to exude power is through making their enemies weaker, but really they are just proving that they have no brains. An intelligent man would know to negotiate, to talk, like you father.”

“You’re right,” she murmurs, curling into his side and raising her face up, the top of her head now pressed against the column of his throat. “I just hope he doesn’t think I’m dead. To have him grieving for no reason… It’s too cruel – barbaric, even. I don’t want to put him through that when I’m fine here, with you.”

His stomach does somersaults at her words, but he supresses it in order to think straight. “Well, I’m sure we can come up with an idea or two, hmm? Maybe you could give me something of yours and I could drop it off at your house, somewhere that your father will see it? I _would_ walk up to him and tell him everything myself but I’m afraid he might get the wrong impression.”

“Mm, probably,” she chuckles briefly at the sarcasm, burrowing her face further into Chanyeol’s throat, the cool kiss of her nose bridge now touching the swell of his Adam’s apple. “I don’t have anything, though. All I had when I ran from the governor was myself and this dress.”

Chanyeol’s frown deepens as he thinks. In his trance, the hand he has placed on the cap of her shoulder starts to card through her hair, bringing the strands to fall like a curtain over her side. It is as smooth as silk, flowing like water through his fingers as he twirls and turns it around, relishing its texture. He kind of wants to rub his face against it—

“Chanyeol.”

The speaking of his name breaks him from his reverie, hand stalling as his brain catches up to what his body is doing. Oh God, he was _touching_ her without her permission! He’s gone and ruined everything, _damn it._

“My hair.”

Heart freezing in his chest, Chanyeol feels the colour drain from his face as he clears his throat. “Right, sorry.”

“No, my hair. Chanyeol, my _hair.”_

Okay, now he’s really confused, and as his hand retreats along the plains of her back he makes an indistinct grunting noise that resembles the groan of a cow, striving to figure out what she’s implying.

“You have a knife, don’t you?” When she sits up, space is inadvertently created between them and Chanyeol feels the cold blowing against his side. He wants her to come back, and is about to trap her against him again when he remembers that she’s asked a question.

“Oh, yeah,” he murmurs, uprooting the hidden blade stored up his sleeve and handing it to her handle-first. “Why?”

After taking the knife, she starts to sift through her hair and hushes Chanyeol as though he is a persistent pest. “Pick some bluebells, I know what I’m doing.”

Not used to being bossed about quite like that, Chanyeol gets to work immediately, spying out the five prettiest bluebells in his vicinity and pulling them cleanly from the ground. He holds onto them carefully to make sure that the petals don’t get damaged, and sits back to watch Baekhee as she cautiously takes a small section of her hair and starts to drag the blade of his knife across it. The separate strands grate against the metal, and Chanyeol finds himself rather sullen at the sight of her tampering with her own beauty, right eye twitching every couple of seconds. Still, she makes something exquisite, and ties the stems of the five bluebells together with the strand of hair, knotting it in such a way that the slippery tress won’t come loose.

“Here we are.” She smiles, accomplished, and holds up her handiwork for them both to gauge on. “So, you’ll leave this at my house, somewhere that my father will see it?”

“I shall make it my top priority,” he promises, beaming as he marvels her creation.

She returns the gesture, leaning in close to his side as she hands the craft over. “My house looks out over the village green, and there’s a pen of sheep to the left of it, one of them is black; you can’t miss it.”

“Got it.” He nods resolutely, handling her ornament with care. “I’ll just go and see how Jongdae’s getting on with supper.”

“Alright.” She smiles, nodding along and contemplating as Chanyeol gets up from the floor, dusty off the backs of his thighs as he goes.

“You’re an awful whisperer by the way, Chanyeol.”

Chanyeol stills, heat blooming across his cheeks up to his ears as he takes in her words and glances tentatively over his shoulder.

“But,” she beams, “I think you’re quite handsome too.”

Too shy to feel smug, Chanyeol nods awkwardly and hurries off to the entrance of their cave, practically falling down as he makes a right pig’s arse of it all and gets his foot stuck in a tree root beneath the ground.

“You like her.” Jongdae speedily gets his accusation in as soon as Chanyeol’s below surface level, glancing up from over the bubbling pot of stew he has hoisted over the fire.

“Don’t.”

“Do.”

“Don’t.”

“ _Do.”_

“Shut up.”

Jongdae cackles. “Getting all defensive, are we? Maybe you _really_ like her? Eh?”

Chanyeol scoffs and chooses to ignore him, focusing his attention on making the bed ready for when Baekhee will go to sleep later on. In the end, he gives her that extra blanket.

 

*

 

The air is crisp the next morning, refreshing to inhale, as Chanyeol strolls through the trees in the direction of town. The forest sings around him: birds tweet, trees sigh, and the plants and bushes gossip to one another in hurried whispers. If he strains his ears hard enough, he swears he can hear the forest’s heartbeat thumping gently beneath the earth.

He’s heading to the village alone today, despite his reluctance to leave Jongdae and Baekhee alone together, should the former say something questionable and unappetising. Nevertheless, he has Baekhee’s token to deliver and he’ll be more discreet if he does it by himself.

With him, he has an empty sack and a small dagger sheathed at his hip, ready to be drawn in the event of danger, as well as his bag of coin hidden discreetly in the front pocket of his doublet. Baekhee’s token is safely tucked into the other pocket, away from the elements, though there is very little weather today; the sky is grey and cloudy but the sun is bright and there is only a minute wind, one that gently rustles the leaves of the treetops and nothing more.

When he reaches town, he’s greeted by villagers milling around going about their business, pulling wagons, hanging out washing, tending to their livestock and crops. He treads his footsteps past the church and the town hall, crosses the bridge over the river, and ends up by the village green, navigating himself to Baekhee’s family home after having spied out the telling black sheep.

It is a quaint property, quite humble, and Chanyeol smiles as imagined scenarios claim reign over his eyes. He can picture Baekhee here, maybe sweeping the porch with a broom or hanging up garlands of lavender around the door. His self-conjured images are so appealing that he finds himself wanting to live in a house like this one day, possibly having Baekhee as his fair maiden ( _wife)_ that all the townspeople will envy. What he would give to have her on his arm.

Keeping quiet, he pushes the wooden gate open and treads the garden path between the long grass towards the house, sheep bleating at his presence. In his bid to remain unseen, he chooses not to go directly up to the front door and instead leaves the token on the path bench by the buddleia, situating it in the centre of the seat, the bluebell petals so vibrant that it will be near impossible for Baekhee’s family to miss.

Mission complete, he starts heading in the direction of the market, crossing the village green and ambling down the central road where small stalls sheltered by awnings lie, fruits and vegetables presented in crates with the local farmers manning them and shouting out todays deals. A sack of potatoes for five pieces of silver – _bargain._

He has just bought a bunch of carrots when he hears the sound of horse hooves clopping along the brick road, a potent hint that someone of importance has just arrived into the humble heart of the village.

His stomach mangles when he sees the face of the governor, the fat man squashing his poor horse into the ground. Their regional ruler has always been overindulgent, and his body does not suggest otherwise. His neck is concealed beneath a second chin and his stomach pours out like how a loaf of bread expands over a fire. His skin is red and greasy, forehead catching the glint of the sun as he surveys the local area with one of the most pompous lours Chanyeol has ever seen.

He is dressed as lavishly as his diet, adorning fabrics dyed with purples, blues and greens, those colours a rarity even for royalty. Wrapped around his shoulders over his plum cloak is a fox fur collar, the two ends held together by an expensive gold brooch. Surrounded in a sea of whites, beiges and browns, he stands out like a sore thumb, and not necessarily in a good way.

It is when Chanyeol is scrutinising the governor’s attire and his shrewd eyes that a lone man rushes into the market, shouting out for their dictator’s attention with his arms flailing about in the air.

“Your Excellency! Your Excellency!” cries the man, bounding to a stop by the governor’s horse and beseeching him with pleading eyes. “This—” he thrusts his right hand into his lord’s face “—This was left at my house, your Excellency! My sister is alive! _Baekhee_ is alive! See? This is her hair! The bluebells – they must be from the wood!”

Chanyeol almost lets a panicked yelp leave his throat but he is able to swallow it down at the last second – too busy doing so, that his reaction to the governor and his mounted companions racing off in the direction of the forest is delayed, and after a moment's contemplation, he springs into action and starts vaulting over the ground.

He cannot fathom why Baekhee’s own blood would sell her out – for the man just manically claimed that she was his sister. Would her family not be interested in keeping her hidden? Protected? Out of the governor’s fat sausage-y hands? Still, there is no time to spend dwelling on that, not when Baekhee herself is in danger and Chanyeol is not there to protect her. The forest is his domain, albeit unofficially, and anyone in there is his to defend.

Flitting through the trees a mile a minute, it dawns on Chanyeol that he won’t get there in time to warn either Baekhee or Jongdae of the oppressors; chances are, he won’t even get there in time to stop them from being discovered either. All he can hope to do is get to them before they’re taken or a sentence is carried out. That way, they all still stand a chance of getting out of this, hopefully with all limbs and lives intact.

Baekhee’s voice sounds out through the woodland, a wail on the wind, and Chanyeol immediately plucks up speed, metal in his mouth and a fire in his chest. He arrives just in time to see her outside the camp being manhandled by two of the governor’s cronies, and he makes the split-second decision to draw attention to himself in order to take it away from her.

“Hey! _Hey!_ Over here!” he yells, racing into the clearing before stumbling to a stop amongst the bluebells. He raises his palms, conceding. “This is all my fault, okay? I took her against her will, I’m keeping her captive here. She hasn’t done anything wrong.”

“ _Chanyeol!”_ Baekhee’s warning goes amiss.

“Well, look who it is,” the governor sneers, still sitting high and mighty atop his horse letting others do his dirty work for him. “It’s _Park Chanyeol._ Your heroic speech, Mr Thief, is unnecessary, for this maiden here still ran away from me and has consequently committed a crime. Nothing you say or do can change that, so the _both_ of you shall be arrested.”

Chanyeol hadn’t considered that.

He probably should have considered that.

From behind him, two more of the governor’s men materialise and take him by the arms, and he looks over to see Baekhee fighting back against her captors who are trying to force her to her knees. It’s outrageous to see her being so carelessly jostled about, the men’s hands indiscreet in where they unnecessarily wander. They touch her, albeit fleetingly, and Chanyeol has never felt so angry before in his life. His blood boils at their filthy hands, but he knows that if he were to yell at them to stop they would only intensify their actions.

He quickly follows the same fight, knees slamming against the compact dirt of the path he takes to and from home every day, and although he has his own men to worry about, his eyes are glued on Baekhee. She is constrained by her shoulders, one man to each, and he narrows his pointed stare at where her captors have positioned themselves; they are neither behind her nor to the side of her, instead they are partially in front of her, their crotches lined up with her face.

“Slit their throats,” the governor orders, deadpan, and Baekhee frantically starts to resist, bawling out in her conquest as she veers away from the men bearing down. She looks up, tears in her eyes, and one of the men tell her what a pretty sight she is, down on her knees.

Chanyeol’s insides jitter with rage, but all hope is not lost. He has one or two tricks up his sleeve. Like his knife, for example.

Ever so carefully, he lowers the blade until it has passed by his palm and fingers, all while the other men are busy arguing over who is to do the throat slitting. So preoccupied with trying to keep their own hands clean, none of them notice that Chanyeol has suddenly acquired a murder weapon – not including the dagger against his hip, as they are all apparently too shallow to have thought of that – and so none of them see it coming. Or rather, see the _knife_ coming.

In one swift move, he drives the tip of his knife into the kneecap of the man to his left, puncturing it through his skin and crunching bone and muscle alike until he’s plunging towards the floor with an almighty roar of pain. Something akin to chaos then ensues as Chanyeol gets to his feet and starts tackling the three remaining men alone, propelling Baekhee to the side lines when and where he can, placing himself in her way.

Skilfully, he pivots and blocks an oncoming punch by deflecting the force with his elbow, then fixing his right fist in pursuit towards the man’s jaw. The punch is clean and knocks the man back a couple of steps. Be that as it may he’s still annoyingly conscious. While he flounders, the other two men advance, and Chanyeol waits for them to make the first move before he proceeds, for one will eventually brazenly charge at him like a buffoon. When the one with the beard does so, Chanyeol dodges his path and props out his foot, tripping him over and launching him face first into the dirt.

Chanyeol sympathises with the plants greatly. Who’d want an ugly mug like that pressed up against them?

The grubby man with blonde hair comes at him next, pitching a punch rather than charging like a bull. Chanyeol springs away, accidentally gambling his footing in a rabbit hole and plummeting forwards into the first man who has come back to get him after his initial attack. With his body arched into an ‘L’ shape, he brings the man down by the middle and sprightly scrambles up to straddle him, landing another punch in the same place before Beard Man grapples him by the shoulders and hauls him backwards. Blondie seizes the opportunity to kick him in the stomach, and Chanyeol decides that it’s time to engage his dagger, the extra help essential now that he’s had the wind knocked out of him.

He draws it dexterously and spears it into Beard Man’s foot, successful in immobilising him and vacillating his control. Seeing the blade reminds Chanyeol of the first man, and he spares a nanosecond to look around to find him lying on the floor bawling over his injury. Bless.

Blondie comes back into play just as Chanyeol rips his weapon out of Beard Man’s foot, and he hurriedly clambers to his feet so that he can swerve into the oncoming storm. Blondie hurtles towards him with a knife of his own, the tip aiming directly for his chest, and Chanyeol fights to try and tire him out just as the other guy – Chanyeol labels him Jawbone in memory of his own heroic hits to said area – comes trooping along.

Unfortunately, he finds himself with his back pinned against a tree trunk as Blondie and Jawbone invade, and he panics for a moment before he catches sight of Baekhee over his shoulder. He longs to shout at her to run, to get away as fast as she can while all the men have their eyes trained on him, albeit he loses his voice when Blondie’s knuckles rush up to meet him and he’s struck square in the face. He gasps so acutely that he chokes on his own breath, and suddenly there is a ringing in his ears that refuses to go away. Yet he cannot afford to waste time mulling over how much it hurts, and instead focuses his energy on bouncing back with his dagger to kick Blondie between the legs and stab Jawbone in the shoulder, so much bone in the way that the blade doesn’t sink in that deep until he adds a greater pressure on his second attempt.

With Jawbone tossing and turning on the ground, whining about how he wants his mummy, Chanyeol spins to face Blondie who is clutching his package downstairs and fighting back a girlish sob or two. He promptly occupies a fair-sized rock to smack against the side of his head and gets into position, raising the rock high in the air and judging his aim until he is sure it will hit his skull head on. Then governor calls out his name and Chanyeol stalls at the sight which greets him.

Up to this point, the fat man has remained on his horse, aloof and distant as he had watched his inferiors fight for him as his orders dictated, and he had been so absorbed in wanting to see Chanyeol lose to his men that he had forgone a sacred opportunity. Until now.

The rock slips from Chanyeol’s grasp as he takes in the sight of Baekhee with a knife rammed against her throat across the clearing – he’s so engrossed that he doesn’t even realise he has accidentally dropped his rock onto Blondie’s face anyway. Seeing Baekhee with another man’s hands on her, seeing her life so horrendously threatened, makes him want to cut the governor up into little pieces and feed him to the dogs.

“Let her go,” he insists sternly, rising to his feet and holding out his dagger in surrender to try and deter the fat man from going any further. The governor only laughs at him, mocking. “Let her go and I won’t kill you,” Chanyeol persists, and the governor guffaws this time, yanking on Baekhee’s hair so that her head is craned backwards.

“Why don’t you put down your arms, Park?” he spits, so complacent that Chanyeol wants to scratch his eyeballs out. “There is no getting out of this. The both of you will hang for your crimes, and you, _Park,_ may even be drawn and quartered.”

There’s movement over the governor’s sloped shoulder, and Chanyeol glimpses a snapshot of Jongdae creeping closer and closer with a giant branch in his hands.

“If I drop my weapon, you have to let her go,” Chanyeol compromises, sort of, already lowering himself into a squat to lay down his dagger, showing that he is a man of his word, sort of. With Jongdae having uprooted an entire tree to take the governor down, he doesn’t feel the need to worry any longer. This is why he is adamant on referring to Jongdae as his trusted friend, as he always has out-of-the-box plans at hand.

The governor snorts. “You think I’ll let her go? After all she’s done to ridicule me?” The grip on Baekhee’s hair gets tighter, as does the vehemence behind the knife wedged against her throat. She whimpers so desperately, hands clawing at the back of the governor’s palm, that Chanyeol still wants to lurch forwards even _with_ the walking tree.

“Let me put it this way, Park. Put down your weapon and I won’t slit her throat here and now.” He grins maliciously with rotten teeth, leaning his face over Baekhee’s shoulder to talk more privately with him. “I’ll do it after I’ve had her in my bed, and I’ll make you—”

Jongdae swings, the branch coming into contact with the governor’s head to the sound of an earthen _pop!_ Baekhee screams from shock, eyes scrunched closed, yet when she realises that she is unscathed she birls around just in time to see Jongdae dropping the branch and the governor collapsing into a heap on the floor, resembling a giant slug. Jongdae grins, and Baekhee throws herself at him with such a high velocity that he loses his balance.

On a regular day, Chanyeol would be annoyed that his friend is getting all the attention, but Baekhee is safe, so he thinks he can just about live with it for now. Once Jongdae has been given his hearty hug, Baekhee comes rushing up to him and reaches up to cradle his face, her features pulled taut with worry.

“Are you alright? Does it hurt? It looks like a nasty hit.”

The pain is focused around his left eye and every blink is turmoil, though Baekhee’s disquiet seems to numb the torment. “It’s fine,” he grunts, flinching when she accidentally presses too hard on his cheekbone. “I can _hardly_ feel a thing.” His words are immediately discredited by the high-pitched strain in his voice – he sounds like a wheezing horse.

She laughs at his efforts, dropping her hands with a fond gaze before asking: “How did he know I was here? The governor, I mean.”

Chanyeol grimaces, an expression that does not go unnoticed by her keen gaze, and he eventually relents. “Your… It was your brother. I left the token at your house like you asked, and when he found it he showed it straight to the governor in the market.”

Confusion swarms her face, then disbelief, and she understandably splutters: “B-But, it can’t have been my brother, he wouldn’t do that to me, he wouldn’t give me up like that, he… he…” She runs out of words, betrayal settling across her features like storm clouds covering a blue sky as she frowns into nothing, too immersed in her thoughts. “That _bastard,”_ she hisses, and just like that she is pushing Chanyeol out of the way and running back towards the village.

He does try to grab her on her exit, but her arm slips between his fingers like a runaway bride and Chanyeol realises that he’s going to have to be the pleading groom. For a beautiful lady, though, he is willing to run.  

“Jongdae, watch the men,” he orders, forgoing a thank you in his haste to keep Baekhee in his sight.

His friend sighs, but nods, and cheesily says: “Sure, just— _go get her_.”

So Chanyeol goes to get her.

With just as much urgency as before, he retraces his steps to the edge of the forest and runs along the highway to the village, passing by the communal buildings before flinging himself over the bridge and finding Baekhee hammering on the front door to her house. He has just floundered to a stop by the garden gate when her brother opens it, skin draining of its colour like the landscape does when the sun moves on.

“Why did you tell him?!” Baekhee shrieks in greeting, pushing her brother back into the house and stepping over the threshold, never minding if she’s welcome or not. “Why would you tell him where I was?!”

The brother immediately tries to keep her at arm’s length by taking hold of her shoulders, evidently distressed at her unanticipated appearance and unnerved by her ferocity. His defences do not last long, though, as Baekhee throws his grip off her in an act of defiance. Chanyeol has always fancied himself a strong, forceful woman, but that’s not important right now.

“I’m sorry, Baek, I really am—”

“Sorry isn’t good enough, Beom, _is it?”_ she growls, and Chanyeol’s stomach goes all jittery because _damn,_ she’s really attractive when she’s angry. Again, not important.

Beom – presumably her brother’s name – starts to go comically red in the face. He resembles her a lot, with a soft jawline and fair skin, and they both share the same identical downturned eyes, though they look better on Baekhee.

“I didn’t know what else to do!” Beom exclaims, staring at her with crazed eyes as he rakes his hands through his hair and tugs on the strands like a lunatic. “The governor put a prize on your head, Baek! A coin prize! When Father was punched by the governor’s men, the wound on the inside of his cheek became infected and we needed the money to buy medicine! I’m sorry, Baekhee! I really am! I had already tried everything else, I even travelled to other markets to try and get higher prices for our cheese but it didn’t work! There was no other way I could save him!”

Baekhee gasps, then sniffles, and lets out a teary rendition of the word “What?” All anger falls through the cracks as she breathes in his words, and then she violently pushes past her brother and disappears down the gloomy hallway headed towards the back of the house.

Chanyeol trails after the siblings, stepping through a doorway and laying his eyes upon an elderly looking man lying down in a bed, the skin around his mouth on the left side of his face tainted by a mixture of red, purple, black and yellow, foam bubbling from the corner of his mouth every time he exhales in his sleep. His face is gaunt and hollow, skeletal body dressed in rags. Even with medicine, Chanyeol doesn’t think there’s much hope of him coming out the other side – unless the other side is heaven.

“Father, no…” Baekhee whispers, voice stolen by tears as she falls to her knees beside the bed and reaches out to cup his spotted face, her own upset rolling down her cheeks. “You fool, you absolute fool.” Her voice can barely be heard over the sound of the spring breeze washing in through the window, yet Chanyeol catches onto the words and finds his heart twisting. There might not be much hope, but there is still _some_ hope.

“Who are you?” Beom turns to him, voice cautious, and Chanyeol shrugs in response. Again, here is another person who does not know his face; he _really_ needs to work harder on building his image.

Having not expected no introduction, Beom turns awkwardly back to his grieving sister on the floor. “Do you forgive me, Baek?” he asks, and Chanyeol has to swallow a scoff at his nerve. “I mean, I—I didn’t mean for it to be this way, I had no other choice!”

Baekhee freezes, and then glares over her shoulder at him crossly with trails of glinting silver trickling down her cheeks. “You think I forgive you?” she demands, incredulous, and stands up to face him head-on again, abruptly wiping her face to conceal weakness. “When you saw my token, the message I had sent to _you_ to tell _you_ I was alive, you went running to the _governor!_ ” she half-screams, voice restricted so as to not wake her sleeping father. “You didn’t even try to look for me yourself! Together we could have worked something out for Father but you just chose the easy way out, so no, I do not forgive you.”

Her anger leaves her like a candle going out in the wind as she solemnly admits: “But I do understand you.”

Crying himself, Beom whines a little, face patchy. “Well, what does that mean?”

She crosses her arms and scowls. “It means I think you’re an idiot, you idiot. But…” she looks back at her sire, new tears pooling in her eyes as her face screws up, “you’re right. I mean, we don’t have any money.” Her voice is nazily and weary, defeat a harsh cognisance.

Chanyeol’s stomach curdles, and he looks between the two children grimly. He knows for a fact that there isn’t even a physician nearby, that they would have to travel far to find one in a city over a hundred miles away. Living in a village, they are secluded from the modernising world on their doorstep, hours away from help.

“Alright,” Baekhee wipes her eyes and stands up straight, “I’ll marry the governor so long as he finds Father a doctor.”

“No, you can’t!”

It should have been Beom asserting that, yearning to shield her no matter what it costs, but it is Chanyeol instead who objects, taking a protesting step forwards. “You can’t marry him!”

“Chanyeol…” she breathes faintly, shaking her head as she peers at him forlornly, “I don’t have another choice.”

His face contorts as he tries to contain his tears, not because Baekhee will be marrying the governor but because he finds it admirable that she is so willing to sacrifice herself for the ones she loves, even when those people may never do the same for her in return. Decidedly, he sinks his hand into his pocket and reaches for his bag of coin, dropping it deliberately onto a nearby table. The loud, jingling thud suggests just how much gold is inside.

“Yes, you do.”

Beom gasps at the sight of such a full and heavy purse, and Baekhee herself gapes at it as if she has never seen so much wealth before in her life. Chanyeol smiles, because these are the moments he lives for, the moments he treasures the most, when he can finally give the worthy mice what the serpents take so blindly for granted. This time, though, it is greatly superior, because it is _Baekhee_ who is the mouse and _Baekhee_ who he is caring for.

“We—We cannot take it, it wouldn’t be right—” Baekhee starts to argue, but cuts herself short when Chanyeol informs her that it is a gift. Her eyes sparkle when she looks at him, so breathtaking without meaning to be, and then she closes the distance between them and wraps her arms around his middle, pressing the side of his face against his chest and whispering an earnest: “Thank you, Chanyeol, thank you so much.”

Chanyeol embraces her dotingly in return, savouring the feeling of having her in his arms, and he leans down to rest his chin against the crown of her head. She is the perfect height for chin resting, he learns.

“You can’t stay here,” he eventually tells her a minute into their hug, “not with the governor knowing you’re alive and where we live.”

Against him, he feels her nod, a subtle gesture that he only picks up on because he’s so hyperaware of her being. “I know, I know,” she sighs, shaky intakes of breath hissing down her throat.

“We can’t expect Jongdae to keep them knocked out forever either,” he jokes, lightening the atmosphere with his own chuckle and Baekhee’s subsequent laugh.

She retreats, smiling radiantly up at him, eyes dewy, and agreeing. “I suppose not.”

“Y-You’re _leaving?”_ Beom gasps, scandalised, looking even more so when he glances at Chanyeol and wrenches his face up in disgust. “With _him?”_

“ _He_ has just paid for Father’s medical bills, why don’t you show him some respect?” Baekhee snaps, successfully shutting up her flustered brother. Chanyeol sneers at him while she’s not looking, and he may or may not stick out his tongue. “I’ll just go and fetch a few of my things.”

An awkward silence follows, in which Chanyeol does his best to keep his expression vacant and Beom looks back across at him repeatedly. Baekhee’s father continues to sleep on the low bed pressed against the wall, and when Chanyeol looks further around the room he sees the carcasses of rabbits hanging from the ceiling over a wash basin and bundles of rosemary and thyme gathered on the windowsill. This room is a kitchen, apparently, though Chanyeol sees no place for a fire.

“You’re not allowed to touch her. Ever,” the brother warns, breaking the silence with his useless fretting. Chanyeol cannot help but smirk.

“And why’s that?” he wonders, tagging along just to see what Beom will say next.

“Because I say so, of course, I’m her brother.”

“Oh,” Chanyeol nods, unconvinced, “right.”

There’s a long pause, until: “And you can’t ever see her naked, I won’t let you do that either.”

“Surely it is her decision whether she puts clothes on or not, not mine or yours,” he objects, crossing his arms and angling his body towards his lacking competition with a scowl.

“You know what I mean,” he insists, eyes wide, “she is _not_ being defiled by _you._ ”

“What if I want him to defile me?” Baekhee reappears with a smug smile and a whole new wardrobe. She’s wearing a white shirt under corset bodice embroidered in patterns of varying green hues, and a long black woollen skirt which flows out to the ground to sweep along the floor with every step she takes. With this new formfitting attire, Chanyeol has a lovely view of her slender waist and tapered hips, and there is a certain asset which has been brought to life by the boost of her bodice. Her chest is very favourable, indeed, and Chanyeol becomes flustered from his own perversions.  

“Y-Yeah,” he stutters, looking back at Beom and putting his hands on his hips. “What if she wants me to?”

Baekhee laughs at him, and Chanyeol enjoys the horrified expression her brother makes while she is busy bidding goodbye to her father. Once she’s done, Chanyeol offers to carry her sack for her – she refuses – and then they are on their way.

“That was easier than expected,” she remarks as they leave the village, heading back to the forest. “I thought it would be harder to leave them behind, but it wasn’t. We won’t be gone forever, though, will we? That’s probably why.”

Shaking his head, Chanyeol agrees. “We just need to wait for this whole ordeal to blow over, then we’ll be back and you can see your father again.”

She hums, angling her face towards the sunlight and bathing in it. “I heard everything my brother said,” she grins, looking across at him with a scary glint in her eyes. Chanyeol struggles to swallow. “You should know, Chanyeol, that him and I do not share the same views on those things.”

“O-Oh, really?”

“Really.” She nods, waggling her eyebrows once before laughing and looking back towards the sun, face aglow with golden light, body bathed in the heaven’s glory.

 

*

 

Before they even see Jongdae, they hear him exclaiming “Oh, thank _God!”_ through the trees and jogging into view. He comes striding up to them, slipping his leather coif off his head and exasperatedly scratching through his hair before he announces: “I think I might have killed one of them.”

“Well, accidents happen,” Chanyeol replies diplomatically with a shrug, making Baekhee chuckle delicately behind her fingertips.

Jongdae looks her up and down and whistles. “My, my, doesn’t the maiden look lovely? Give us a twirl, love.”

“ _Jongdae.”_ Jongdae ignores him, Baekhee too busy spinning for his friend.

“ _Oooh_ , very nice,” Jongdae grins, arching a suggestive eyebrow in Chanyeol’s direction while he fondles his earring – a subconscious habit of his. “I’ve bound all five men by their ankles and wrists, by the way, and they’re all currently knocked out over there.” He points through the trees on his left. “As I said, I think one might be dead now. I had to hit him on the head over five times to keep him unconscious. I heard a crack at some point so I think I might have broken his skull or something.”

“Mehh,” Chanyeol makes an unintelligible noise as he glances briefly in the direction of their prisoners. “Occupational hazard.” He holds no remorse for what the three of them combined have brought down upon those men. It all feels like sweet, sweet justice to him.

“We’re leaving, by the way,” he announces. “Moving on to greener pastures, as it were. Evading the governor is a must.”

Jongdae sighs through gritted teeth, annoyed, all joy of seeing Baekhee in a different outfit eradicated with that single statement. “I was just starting to like this place,” he moans bitterly, flattening his coif back over his unruly curls and turning to Baekhee. “Are you coming with us?”

“Of course she’s coming with us,” Chanyeol butts in, offended, and Jongdae laughs teasingly at him.

“Alright, lover boy, I was just asking. Where are we off to then?”

“I think we should go south, towards the coast,” Chanyeol suggests as they start walking back to camp. “What do you two think?”

“Sounds good to me,” Jongdae says, and Baekhee nods with a smile.

“I’ve never seen the sea,” she admits, and Chanyeol grins brightly.

“Then allow me to be your guide.”

Again, Jongdae pretends to throw up.

It doesn’t take long for them to pack their life up into a collection of sacks, four in total. Though they have to leave some blankets and pillows behind, Chanyeol remains optimistic; the south is warmer and less people know his face there, hopefully they won’t have to live in hiding anymore.

Evening is filtering in by the time they set off officially, and mist comes rolling through the trees to turn the bluebells into a hazy mass of purple swirls. Jongdae is stalking off ahead with his signature staff, gently singing a folk tune known by every man, woman and child in the country, while Chanyeol and Baekhee wander laxly behind, not in a rush to be anywhere anytime soon.

When they start climbing down a shallow hill, Baekhee reaches her hand across to take his, and calmly, Chanyeol entwines their fingers together, enjoying the feel of her silky smooth skin against his own rougher palm.

“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” she says animatedly, voice soft so as to not disturb the peace of the evening. “I barely know you.”

Chanyeol smirks, digging the toes of his shoes into an incline. “How reckless, you are. I can’t say I condone running off with a stranger.”

“I don’t think I condone it either,” she plays along, biting her lip as she fights to contain a grin, relying on Chanyeol to help keep her footing as they meander among the tree roots. “But what about running away with a potential lover, surely you must condone that?”

Chanyeol halts at the same time that the world stands still, then they just look at each other, Baekhee hopeful and Chanyeol anxious for the first time in his life. He admires the way that her skin seems to glow, the way that it absorbs the moisture of the air and her complexion transform into something dewy and youthful. He adores the way her eyes can sparkle even without any light present, and how they squint so sweetly at him when he does something to make her smile. He reveres in her fighting spirit, her will to remain positive no matter what happens, and as his heart starts to hammer against his chest, he realises that he actually likes her quite a lot.

He loses sight of her face, though, for she disappears completely as he goes into a significant state of shock. She is kissing him, only chastely and lightly, but she is _kissing him_. Her lips are soft, as smooth as a bluebell’s petals, and when it’s over she holds a single flower out to him by the stem, panting adorably through parted lips as she presents to him the embodiment of her gratitude: a bluebell.

Elated with his head in the clouds, Chanyeol tenderly takes the stem from her fingers and hooks it securely behind her ear, the violet petals glowing lilac against her alabaster skin. From this distance, he can see every fine detail on her face, can bear witness to each pore, eyelash and hair, and he marvels at how she manages to be so effortlessly beautiful. One would expect a maiden who has been living out in the woods for all of five days to look like a savage beast by now, but the word ‘nymph’ suits her better.

“ _Oi!_ ” Jongdae calls, severing the afterglow of their first kiss like a foghorn. “If we want to pass the county border by nightfall, we can’t be having heart-to-hearts in the middle of the woods! Put a spurt on!”

They laugh like a pair of little children who have been caught misbehaving, Baekhee’s eyes gleaming with mischief in tandem with her cunning smirk as they appease Jongdae by walking on, meeting him at the peak of a tree-covered hill with their hands laced together and the bluebell tucked behind her ear, a romantic semblance to Chanyeol’s ever growing emotions. All he can think of as he holds her hand and mirrors her steps is that this feels so  _right,_ so  _easy,_ and the first inkling of fear is sewn into his soul at the notion of losing her. If had exclusive dominion over their blossoming relationship, he would decree that it would be everlasting, constant, and it does worry him slightly that Baekhee may one day turn around and put an end to it all. Yet with the look in her eyes as they share another loving glance, Chanyeol's worries are blown out of the water. 

May there be bluebells in the south and further still, and pray there be a fair maiden among them.

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**Author's Note:**

> **Please note that I do not want constructive criticism. Please do not share negative opinions or thoughts about this story in the comments, in bookmarks or on Twitter. Thank you :)**


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